


179. pale masks

by piggy09



Series: The Sestre Daily Drabble Project [23]
Category: Orphan Black (TV)
Genre: Gen, Graffiti
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-23
Updated: 2016-07-23
Packaged: 2018-07-26 04:53:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 739
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7561186
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/piggy09/pseuds/piggy09
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“<em>Shit</em>,” Sarah hisses, staring at the new mural on the wall. She’s holding a can of spraypaint in one hand and she shakes it despairingly, staring at the collection of abstract lines. The Angel’s been here again, god <em>damn</em> her. The last mural just got painted over half a week ago, and Sarah had her idea and got over here as fast as she could and—</p><p>She’s been beat to the punch. <em>Again</em>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	179. pale masks

**Author's Note:**

> I really should stop writing Helena as a graffiti artist. I don't know how that keeps happening.

“ _Shit_ ,” Sarah hisses, staring at the new mural on the wall. She’s holding a can of spraypaint in one hand and she shakes it despairingly, staring at the collection of abstract lines. The Angel’s been here again, god _damn_ her. The last mural just got painted over half a week ago, and Sarah had her idea and got over here as fast as she could and—

She’s been beat to the punch. _Again_.

It’s a beautiful mural, she’ll admit it. An outward spray of sharp angles, black and white and red, that doesn’t look like anything much. But when Sarah unfocuses her eyes she can see wings, and teeth, and the break-neck angles of bones. She’s not enough of a twat to spray over fresh paint, so all she can do is stare at the wall and shake the can in a gesture born less of anger and more of general frustration.

It’s just that – this is all she _has_. Sarah tags and she feels better. Feels less like this whole damn city is a cage built just for her. Feels less like hopping the next train out of town and just _running_ until she reaches the sea.

And now she doesn’t have this. She can find another wall, but…she’d wanted _this_.

Sarah twists her mouth down and stares at the one blank patch of wall. She uncaps the can.

* * *

Part of Helena’s night is checking on all of her babies. The side of the bridge, the back alley, the wall of Jesse’s store that he had paid her _money_ to make art on. (That one is Helena’s favorite baby, although she would never tell the others. If anyone painted over it she would find them, and hurt them.) And the new place, the angriest angel that Helena has let out of her veins. Over by the—

Oh. Helena pulls her bandana up over her mouth, pulls her hood over her face, and – with her mask on – and steps closer to the paint. It’s fresh. There’s a _girl_ in the corner, painted on, a patch of shadows leaking from around her and blending into the wings of Helena’s angel. Clever! Clever clever. Lonely little girl standing in the dark. Helena can’t tell if she’s jealous or afraid.

But Helena knows the art. Helena knows the orphan-girl. She’s painted all around town, near Helena and far from Helena, always surrounded by shadow, always lonely. And now she’s _here_. Helena reaches up light fingertips and touches the paint; she breathes through her mouth so that she doesn’t have to smell it.

It’s not wet anymore. The paint. But it’s _there_.

* * *

Sarah swings by the wall the next night, just in case – who knows. In case the Angel painted over her art. In case she somehow respected Sarah’s bullshit made-up claim to this wall and scraped off all her paint.

Sarah stops when she gets to the wall. Looks at it. Blinks.

The mural is _gone_. Or – not gone, but. But. Someone got black paint and let Sarah’s shadow ooze around that tangle of lines, eating it alive. It’s almost a blank space. The entire _wall_ is black, it must have taken _forever_. How many cans of black paint Sarah doesn’t know.

The mural is swallowed by the black, mostly, but there’s a new part too: one single claw-line, reaching out for the girl in the center. The girl Sarah would never tell anybody is her, small and scared and alone.

And someone drew the shape on the wall reaching for her.

Sarah stares at that desperate soft shape. She bites her lip.

* * *

There’s an army of girls and they’re pulling the shadow back. Helena leans in closer to see the way their fingers are painted – tiny neat shapes, folded perfectly around her black scribblings. _Very_ nice. Well made.

And they’ve left her a space. There are so many tiny identical girls, and they are pulling the black away from Helena’s angel, and now there is a blank white space left open for it to grow.

She smiles at the mural. Says: _heh_.

* * *

There’s a mural on a wall somewhere downtown. A scribbling of something that might be an angel, and an army of identical girls. And one girl in particular – different than the others, somehow, made different by some inner light. Or maybe it’s the smile on her face, painted in sincere and big.

And she’s holding the angel’s hand.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Please kudos + comment if you enjoyed! :)


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